When reporting about the election of the Pope, it seems journalists have their pet words. Listen and count how many times you hear 'change','scandal', 'crossroads', 'crisis', 'conflict', 'abuse' and 'corruption'. I suspect you may find quite a few of these words used over and over. When the media call for 'change' in the Church they usually mean that the Church should change their ideas about abortion, contraception, divorce, same-sex marriage and the ordination of women. But even the Pope, no matter how much 'power' the media think he has, cannot change what Scripture teaches and they cannot change what previous Popes have taught as dogma. How can the claim that the pope's teaching is infallible be true if the next pope can undo his teaching? By the way, infallibility of the Pope's teaching is only in the area of doctrine and morals (not in practice, as the abstinence from meat on Fridays, for example). Infallibility also applies only when the Pope is speaking ex cathedra or 'from the Chair of Peter'. In recent years there have only been three infallible proclamations by Popes (other than canonizations): Doctrine of Infallibility, Doctrine of the Immaculate Conception and the Doctrine of the Assumption of Mary. These three doctrines were believed in the early Church but were defined in recent years (19th and 20th centuries).
Watch the video from Salt and Light Television (a Catholic Channel in Canada) to see why doctrine cannot be changed.
